This invention pertains to a storage container for magnetic tape cassettes of the type used in home and auto stereos. The storage container contains one or more protuberances which are capable of being located in association with the capstan locating holes of the cassette to fixedly maintain the cassette within the storage container.
Magnetic tape cassettes have recently become the standard of the magnetic tape recording industry for use in home and automobile stereo systems, replacing 8-track systems and, except in the most expensive units, reel-to-reel. The common cassette has a parallel top and bottom surface with two openings which are slightly to one side of the longitudinal axis of a cassette. Within these two openings are two spoked hubs which are used to drive the tape within the cassette. Two sets of mutually perpendicular side surfaces are placed in between the top and bottom surface and together the side surfaces and the top and bottom surface form a sort of box-like container for the tape inside. One of the side surfaces has a plurality of openings in it through which the tape is exposed for transmittal of its information to the heads of the tape recorder. Adjacent to these openings and extending between the top and bottom surfaces are two capstan locating holes. Only one of these holes is utilized at a time by the recorder. However, when the tape is flipped from side A to side B the opposite capstan locating hole is utilized by the recorder. The cassette is labeled by placing either a paper or metallic label on both the top and bottom surfaces with appropriate openings in the label to allow for exposure of the spoked hubs. These labels are permanently glued to the top and bottom surfaces and thus are not replaceable if damaged or destroyed.
The cassettes can be purchased with prerecorded information on them or the user can record his own information thereon. When purchased these cassettes, at least the better quality ones, are shipped in a small plastic container. This container provides excellent protection of the cassette. However, when the cassettes are used in mobile applications such as automobiles, boats, etc., these containers are found to be bulky, take up considerable amount of space, and are subject to being jarred open. Further, when stored in a situation such as in the glove compartment of an automobile there is no way to maintain them in an organized manner so that the user may extract a particular cassette while still maintaining concentration on his driving.
Another area in which cassettes are finding widespread use is in the field of prerecorded information such as language courses, bible studies and the like. Normally these courses or studies include a plurality of tapes the exact number depending on the amount of information which is being conveyed. When a plurality of these tapes having a unified subject matter are sold they are usually packaged in a single container. One of the most popular forms of these containers is a book-like container having a protective, hard outer casing and flexible page-like members which have attached to them a plurality of individual cassette holders.
One of the book-like containers mentioned above utilized a locking system which prevents the tapes from accidentally being spilled out of the individual cassette holders. This locking system is based on having a projection which is capable of fitting into the openings where the spoked hubs are located. Unfortunately in order to place the projection within the opening of the spoked hub it is necessary to first slide this projection across the surface of the label of the cassette. It doesn't take too many insertions and withdrawals of a cassette into and out of the holder before the projection starts to destroy the surface of the label. Once this process is started it seems to apparently escalate with each additional insertion and withdrawal until the indicia on the label are either obliterated or the label is torn from the cassette. Further, since this projection is located to fit within the opening of the spoked hub it has to be located in the center of the individual cassette holder despite the fact that the spoked hubs aren't directly in the center of the cassette to allow the cassette to be inserted without regard to its top and bottom surface. This locates the projection on one side or the other of the opening. Because the projection must be capable of being distorted to allow it to slide over either the top or bottom surface of the cassette before being placed in the opening of the spoked hubs, the surface to which the projection is attached has to be flexible. However, since this surface is flexible, once the projection is located over the opening of the spoked hubs the projection must be of sufficient proportions to fit deeply enough against one side or the other of the opening of the spoked hub without allowing the cassette to slip from the holder. The necessity to proportion this projection large enough to allow it to do this further causes this same projection to dig even deeper into the label on the cassette when the cassette is being slid in and out of the holder.